Transplant digging machines of the prior art (e.g. Juhl, U.S. Pat. No. 3,512,276, May 19, 1970) can operate only at the front or rear of, and longitudinally from, a tractor or the like, and thus they cannot dig-up a tree or shrub which is medially located in an inner row without damaging closely adjacent trees if the tractor were angled as would be needed for the operation. It is accordingly the principal object of this invention to provide a front- or rear-mountable transplant digging machine or root-pruner (for mounting on conventional power-operated vehicles) which is laterally operable with the vehicle positioned between and oriented parallel to closely spaced rows of trees or shrubs. A further object is to provide such a transplant digging machine with at least one row-paralleling blade to serve as a thrust-neutralizing anchor and/or as an along-row root-cutter. Other objects and advantages will become apparent as the following detailed description proceeds.